The Relevance Paradox: Why Staying The Same Is As Risky As Changing

Last week, we looked at the cautionary tales of brand extensions — the “Bad” and the “Ugly.” We saw how even strong brands can dilute their equity and confuse their customers by stretching too far, too fast.

That raised a critical question: If ill-conceived extensions are a trap, what does healthy, long-term brand growth look like?

This week, we answer that question. We’re moving from the cautionary tale to the playbook for enduring brand relevance. This is the “Good.” The art of managing a brand over time, navigating the middle years, and executing a powerful revitalization when the time is right. That means solving the central paradox of brand strategy: when to protect the immense value your brand earns from consistency and when to embrace the necessary risk of change.

Let’s explore both sides of that paradox. We’ll look at the power of staying the course, the threats that demand a pivot, and the playbook for navigating this important choice.

The Case for Consistency: Why Sticking to the Job Wins

In a world that prizes disruption, consistency can seem boring. It’s not. It’s a strategic advantage. Brilliant taglines, differentiating brand pillars, and breakthrough programs can be lost with a branding change. The impact of a strong brand feature or program is elevated by consistency over time for several reasons.

It Builds Lasting Memory: Experiencing brand programs over time solidifies their place in memory and their connection to the brand. The Progressive Insurance’s Flo and her crew, used since 2008, gives the brand a light personality and a way to talk about insurance products without stimulating skepticism (or boring the audience).
It Owns a Position: It is difficult to duplicate brand equity that has been built over many years. For decades, Volvo has owned “safety”, Disney has owned “Magical Family Entertainment”, and Charmin has owned “Softness”. A competitor trying to challenge Charmin’s position on softness would face a significant challenge.
It Creates Familiarity and Trust: Brand continuity creates a sense of comfort that translates into liking. This familiarity also builds credibility and a feeling of authenticity. A significant branding change can reduce this reassuring feeling.
It’s Cost-Effective: Once a strong position is established, it is relatively inexpensive to maintain because you are reinforcing instead of breaking new ground. You avoid the expensive and uncertain process of finding new positions and paying for new creative executions.

Three Threats That Demand a Change

While consistency is powerful, no brand can afford to be static. There are real threats that can make a brand irrelevant, and they must be addressed. A brand can lose relevance in three primary ways.

The Subcategory is Declining: This is a major threat in dynamic markets where customers stop buying what your brand is perceived to be making. If a large group of customers now wants EVs, it doesn’t matter how great your gas powered vehicle is perceived to be. Your brand, while strong in its category, becomes irrelevant to buyers who have moved on. This is a relevance issue, not a brand preference problem.
A “Reason Not to Buy” Emerges: A brand can lose relevance when it fails to deliver on its promise in a way that creates a reason for customers to avoid it. This often stems from a fundamental breach of trust, such as when the Cambridge Analytica scandal revealed that Facebook had enabled the widespread misuse of user data, creating a powerful, privacy-based reason for people to leave the platform. It can also be tied to other ethical issues, such as perceptions of Nike’s use of foreign factory workers or Nestlé’s promotion of infant formula.
The Brand Loses Energy: A brand without energy becomes invisible. It starts to feel tired and dated, eventually getting lost in the clutter of the marketplace. For a brand, invisibility is the first step toward irrelevance. Ask Bed Bath & Beyond.

The Revitalization Playbook: Strategic Responses to Threats

When a brand faces one of these threats, a strategic response is required. The choice of strategy depends entirely on the nature of the threat.

If the subcategory is declining, you have five options:

Gain Parity: Create an offering that is close enough to a competitor’s must-haves so that your brand is no longer excluded. McDonald’s did this by introducing the McCafé line to compete with Starbucks.
Reposition: Modify the brand to make its value proposition more relevant to a broader market. L.L. Bean repositioned from a hunting and fishing heritage to a broader outdoor firm to appeal to hikers, bikers, and skiers.
Leapfrog the Innovation: Instead of parity, attempt to create a superior offering that spawns a new subcategory. Google leapfrogging Yahoo is a classic example.
Stick to Your Knitting: Continue with the same strategy and value proposition, but execute it better. In-N-Out Burger has maintained intense loyalty with a simple menu (as well as a community-building “secret” menu), ignoring healthy eating trends to focus on uncompromising quality and service.
Disinvest or Exit: If other options aren’t feasible, shift resources from the declining market to a rising one. In 2018, Ford decided to phase out its sedan business to focus on more profitable lines.

If a “reason not to buy” emerges, you have two primary moves:

Negate the Negative: Directly address the problem and create a compelling story around the fix. To fight its quality perception, Hyundai created “America’s Best Warranty,” a 10-year, 100,000-mile warranty that graphically told a new quality story.
Change the Discussion: Instead of arguing about the negative, create an alternative perspective. Facing criticism over its labor and supplier practices, Walmart launched a massive sustainability initiative. This program was so significant it changed the dialogue around the brand.

The Analyst’s Playbook: Guardian of Objectivity

Given the power of consistency, the case for change must be compelling. This is where the analyst becomes the essential guardian of objectivity. Why? Because organizations have biases toward change.

Brand managers get bored with existing strategies and assume customers are too. They are trained to create change, and doing so is often perceived as the path to career advancement. Your role is to counter these biases with sound, objective analysis. The decision to change should not be left to someone’s instinct.

Before supporting any major brand change, ensure these four questions are answered with data:

Why is change truly needed? Are the assumptions driving the change supported with certainty? Is the real problem the brand, or is it a weakness in the offering or a competitive innovation that a brand shift won’t fix?
How likely is the new strategy to succeed? Will a changed brand vision or program actually improve strategic outcomes?
Can we make a less radical change? Is there a way to adapt that avoids gutting the brand-building consistency that created the brand’s strength in the first place?
Are our own biases affecting this decision? Acknowledge the organizational pressures and personal aspirations that can lead to ill-advised choices.

Final Thought

Brand consistency builds equity, owns a position, and creates cost efficiencies. But consistency does not mean strategic stubbornness. There are valid reasons for changing a brand strategy, such as a changing marketplace or a weak execution.

The goal is to have a clear, compelling brand vision that endures and drives fresh, contemporary programs. A change should only be made when the rationale is objectively and thoroughly vented. There must be a good, well-researched reason to abandon consistency. The brands that endure are the ones that master this balance.